What counts as young?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 12:36 PM

I think Guest (who knows better than all of us) has it right, the great grandchildern will be The Copper Family, as they should be.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 12:34 PM

The youngER Coppers?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 11:08 AM

Guest, funnily enough, after I posed that question, the same question came to me in reference to The Watersons and The Carthys, I'd bet there'll be another dynasty there. The tradition, I believe, despite what some doomsayers are predicting, is in very good hands.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:07 AM

Lord B's K said

'so what will they call the great-grandchildren of Bob Copper? because sure as sure is, there will be a group.'

A very good question...so far there are 4 girls and one boy. They can't be the Youngest Coppers because they won't be for ever. Anyone who was at Hastings this year will have seen Ruby (3 1/2) come rushing up to join in with Thousands or More, a song she'd never been taught but had picked up by hearing the Youngs and the Olds singing together. There was hardly a dry eye in the house - particularly amongst those on stage. So it looks as if from these early signs there will be another generation following on...and maybe female-dominated this time. It'll probably revert back to The Copper Family like it is whenever we get together.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Newport Boy
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:05 AM

Don't know about a definition of 'young', but I've always liked the definition of 'old' as '10 years older than me'.

Phil (72)

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Aeola
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:25 AM

'what counts as young'
Basically you need some form of definition to put different ages into perspective. I think Oscar Wilde summed it up very nicely' the old believe everything; the middle aged suspect everything; the young know everything.'

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Howard Jones
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 02:15 PM

I arrived at the hall where my band was playing for a birthday ceilidh, and my heart sank when I saw the banners and balloons saying "Happy 50th Birthday". I thought, "Oh no, it'll be full of old people". Then reality caught up ...

Howard Jones
(54 next week)

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 01:52 PM

I use a sliding scale.

People more than 10 years younger than me are "young."

Russ (Permanent GUEST and old fart)

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 01:46 PM

"Its a weird thing. You see these brilliant young classical musicians and you see these bright exuberant pop musicians.

Somehow it doesn't really work with folkmusic. Dylan managed to affect a world weary tone and overcame limitations of instrumental technique on his first album - but I can't really think of anybody else who pulled it off."

Martin Carthy?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 01:15 PM

so what will they call the great-grandchildren of Bob Copper? because sure as sure is, there will be a group.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Jonny Sunshine
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 01:13 PM

When people say "young" I think they usually mean "younger than me"

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 12:20 PM

Folknacious said
"I read somewhere that Bob Copper still thought he was 29 in his head. He was around 85 externally at the time."

I can assure you that Bob Copper not only thought he was 29, he acted as though he were 29! His stamina was quite remarkable for a man of his age and his willpower enormous. On our many trips to America he would over 'indulge' himself and yet rise early the next day cheerful and ready to do it all over again - unlike the rest of the family. On his 85th birthday he walked 9 miles and enjoyed himself immensely. He was never 'old' in the worst sense of the word and enjoyed nothing more than mastering his computer and the mysteries of email which he saw as an essential means of modern communication (although he viewed conventional letter writing as both an art and a pleasure). He would have been most amused at the appellation given to his grandchildren, 'The Young Coppers' - only one of them is under 30!

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 08 Jul 08 - 11:56 PM

Meaningless trivia possibly meriting taking of offense:

On MySpace, the maximum age you can enter to search for anyone is 68.

_{(So I can only look for hot young ladies.)}

John

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: theleveller
Date: 08 Jul 08 - 05:58 AM

"I was just curious to know how we decide when to expect better of the latter category."

The older you get, the less you expect of others - it's one way of avoiding disappointment.

Nikos Kazantzakis, in The Saviours of God, wrote 'I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.' It become his epitaph. I think it'll be mine, too (hopefully not too soon).

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Golightly
Date: 08 Jul 08 - 05:26 AM

Thanks all, even I wasn't sure what I was getting at when I started this thread. Lots of you are happy in your bones whatever your age, and good luck to you.

But I think Eliza came closest to what was puzzling me when she said she's exactly the same age as John Spiers but he's a 'young musician' and she's 'old guard'. But at least they have both served their apprenticeships and become top class performers, unlike some musicians of a similar age from whom we seem to accept less because they are perceived as young and new (even if they're not). I was just curious to know how we decide when to expect better of the latter category.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 10:29 PM

I just passed my 77th birthday last month and I'm doing fine, thank you. The singing voice still seems to be okay. Whenever I record something and play it back, it sounds about the same as it did when I was in my thirties.

But I can vouch for the statement that inside every septuagenarian, there is a teen-ager saying, "What the hell happened!??"

Oliver Wendell Holmes, at the age of ninety, was walking across a college campus with a colleague. It was a windy day, and as they passed a couple of pretty young coeds whose skirts were being blown about some, Holmes heaved a nostalgic sigh and said, "Ah, yes! It makes me wish I were seventy again!"

If you didn't know how old you are, how old would you be?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Gulliver
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 09:27 PM

We had to move from our singing session in a local pub last year (in Dublin). The youngest of us was over 40. Shortly afterwards a trad group with a gang of followers came in to take up the vacant spot. The oldest was about 23. I sometimes drop in to listen for old times' sake, but by God these youngsters are far better musically than we ever were, and their singing will catch up. God bless progress...

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Spleen Cringe
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 04:36 PM

At forty four I'm at least five years younger than I was when I was thirty four, but a good ten years old than I was when I was twenty nine.

And I have a much better record collection. Oh how lovely it is to skip between Walter Pardon and the Wooden Shjips.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: theleveller
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 03:02 PM

Everyone should believe in something, Paul, no matter how far fetched.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Banjiman
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 02:47 PM

Me (I believe it!)

Paul

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 02:03 PM

In a recent interview, (Mojo) Johnny Rotten said that a personal highlight for him was meeting Maddy Prior

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 02:01 PM

Well, I'm almost 60, and I'm still not used to being referred to as an adult. Still, I look like somebody who would sing folk songs.

But does Johnny Rotten look like a person who would do punk rock? Does Mick Jagger look like a rock 'n' roll singer? Would they sing that stuff nowadays if they weren't getting paid well to do it?

Mick and Johnny should let their hair go grey (or bald), grow a beard and a paunch and get reading glasses, buy acoustic guitars, and sing "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"

Can you picture Mick and Johnny doing a duet on "Kumbayah"?

-Joe-

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Folknacious
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 01:55 PM

I read somewhere that Bob Copper still thought he was 29 in his head. He was around 85 externally at the time. On the other hand I saw a floor singer the other week who did a convincing external impression of being around 25 but was obviously internally a pensioner - a seriously grumpy, boring, academic blighter (and singer/songwriter too)

But in general terms - Shooting Roots set their upper limit as 25 I think. That's a good rule of folk thumb for young. Then you get a gap of about 20 years until you become middle aged, probably 45-59. Then another gap until "old", which is 75 up. What the hell people do in those missing years is hard to imagine. Bring up children and grand children I suppose.

To paraphrase a well-known cartoon: on the internet, nobody knows you're a pensioner. Unless you make comments about "punk rock" as if it happened just last week and was still topical . . .

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Harmonium Hero
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 01:37 PM

Actually, just thinking about it, I've realised that when many of us were young folkies, we probably weren't though of as such, because the average age of performers and audience alike was a lot lower than it is now. I don't think terms like 'young folk' (in this context) were ever used.
John Kelly.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 01:28 PM

Nothing wrong with being a real estate agent, been there, done that, made some good money doing it as well, enough that I bought and paid for the house I now live in. Age, who cares?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Peace
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 01:27 PM

I will have enough time to age when I'm dead.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Harmonium Hero
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 01:25 PM

TJ is right - it is mostly attitude and activity - or lack of it. What's 'middle age' anyway? To know you're middle aged surely requires that you know how old you'll be when you die. It's just an attitude, which some of us haven't got. And in the phrase 'acting your age', surely the significant word here is 'acting'. Why pretend?
Richard: responsible adult? I don't think anybody's levelled that accusation at me. I always thought grown-ups were boring, and never wanted to be one. And I haven't.
Valmai: perhaps you are getting up/going to bed at the wrong times; try getting up at the time you feel 17 and ....I'll shut the door on me way out shall I?
John Kelly.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:59 PM

I'll be 68 next month, but I'm still backpacking and skiing and playing music. When my late father read his paper, he always looked at the obituaries first. He said, "If I don't see my name in there, I go in the kitchen and have a cup of coffee." I won't settle for that - just surviving. Most of us have known people who seemed "born old." Some of it is genetics, much of it is attitude and activity.
I see young performers and enjoy their enthusiasm and energy - and pray they keep that flame burning as the get older.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:50 PM

Johnny Rotten is also a real estate dealer and agent...

Now my daughter kindly bought me a T-shirt inscribed "cunningly disguised as a responsble adult", and a folk fiddler I know who I suspect is in late 40s freely admits that in her family her children are the adults.

I feel plenty young, so long as I can have a nice nap after lunch!

Oh, and as long as my body does not get a say in the matter!

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:43 PM

Joe, please don't tell you son this, by John Lydon aka Johnny Rotten, of The Sex Pistols fame is 52 years old (born 31 January 1956).

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Bee
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:36 PM

Church story:

Several years ago, my Mom, 78 at the time, reported this from her 79 year old friend: "How nice to see you here today! You know, I was just thinking, we never see any of the old people in church these days... (names several 'old' people, all of them dead). Well, dear me, I guess most of them are dead!" ...pause... "So we must be the old people now! I never noticed!"

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:34 PM

30 is young for a folk musician - and many under-30 folkies seem to prefer singer-songwriter stuff that is distasteful to us older "traditionalists." So, there's a dichotomy, and the word "folk" is stretched to include two radically different sorts of music. But I think the dichotomy has more to do with the type of music, rather than the age of the performer. I like Eliza's "traditional" recordings very much - but I'm not so keen on her "young" stuff.

On the other hand, 30 is pretty old for a popular music performer, as I keep reminding my 35-yr-old punk rocker son.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Nick
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:24 PM

It depends on how old your heart is, so I routinely have mine transplanted on a regular basis.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 12:09 PM

What counts as young? Anyone younger than I am. That reminds me of a shaggy dog story, but as this IS a family run website..

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 11:14 AM

My missis has threatened to weigh me in for three 21 year olds . . .

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Fidjit
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 09:46 AM

All you lot are young. (and the others too) I just had my 75th. !!

Wake up feeling like a 17 year old, but there's none about.

Chas

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Gerry
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 09:37 AM

How about a definition that says you're young until you've been a performer for such and so many years, or recorded such and so many albums? The main problem I see with this definition is that it makes my daughter older than me....

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 08:40 AM

Is a folky zimmerframe a bobzimmermanframe?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: muppitz
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 07:51 AM

I wrote a song about this very subject after I entered the Bromyard FF's Fred Jordan young singers competition, the following year I was too old to enter so by their standard I'm past it!! ;-)
I'm still not sure if I'm classed as young anymore though!

muppitz
x

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: theleveller
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 07:49 AM

Well I'm definitely one of the 'new' old. Not only have I got two grandchildren, I've got an 8-year old daughter and she's several years younger than her cousin's children so she's an aunty with nieces and nephews older than her. Family gatherings can be very confusing!

Anyway, I'm with George Burns when he said that old age isn't so bad when you consider the alternative - I hope I continue to grow old disgracefully for a very long time - that way I may even have paid off the mortgage before I die.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: lady penelope
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 07:27 AM

"Time is an illusion, lunch time doubly so..."

Crikey Eliza, how's it feel to be the "age of a dynasty" and a "major historical figure"...?

Right, where'd I leave ye olde folky zimmerframe....?

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 07:18 AM

Its a weird thing. You see these brilliant young classical musicians and you see these bright exuberant pop musicians.

Somehow it doesn't really work with folkmusic. Dylan managed to affect a world weary tone and overcame limitations of instrumental technique on his first album - but I can't really think of anybody else who pulled it off.

I think many people who DID get a break when they were young (in that era when people were getting breaks!) probably looks back and wishes the break had come when they were more mature.

I've been interested in the poet, Patrick Kavanagh recently. He stipulated that grants from his estate should go to Irish poets in need in their middle years. Perhaps this reflected his years of greatest hardship - the thing is that John Keats wouldn't have qualified for one of his grants.

Theres no simplistic answer - some people seem to hit their creative peak differently to others.

About thirty years ago I did this Open University Summer School. I met this Welsh nationalist ex-miner called Gwynn Philips, he was 78 years old and doing the foundation course like me. He was getting better grades than me, he was more creative, more witty, more alive, more young! than I think I have ever been.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: greg stephens
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 07:14 AM

Back in the 60's, you were only young till you were about 21.Nowadays you can be young for ages, till 40 at least. The distinction between John Spiers(young) and Eliza Carthy(not young) is interesting. I think EC loses out on youngness by being part of a folk dynasty, or folk's Royal Family(pick cliche according to which journailst you read last).This gives her the age of the dynasty, rather than her own age, and she becomes a major historical figure: who,in the nature of such beings, cannot be young.They are part of the Old Days.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: fat B****rd
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:59 AM

I've been 42 for 19 years now. But like Valmai, I rise at 78 and get younger as the day (and me) wears on.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Stu
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:46 AM

I'm an over-the hill and quite decrepit 41 year old.

I'm guessing Eliza you're considered one of the old guard simply because you've a body of work behind you, despite your tender years. Anyway, folkies are like a good cheese or fine wine, they mature well and gather a depth and complexity that can only come with age an experience. I'm counting on it.

Old age isn't what it used to be. My dad is 70 this year, and he still enjoys and ale or three yet I can remember when his Mum and Dad were their age and seemed so . . . aged in attitude, whereas the old pot and pan is still very active and not at all old in outlook.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:45 AM

I thought I was young - until the other day.

I was picking my nose and out popped a maggot.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: theleveller
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:38 AM

"John Spiers of Bellowhead is considered a young performer, and I am considered one of the old guard, though we are exactly the same age...
xe
;-)"

Eyup young lass, I knew yer mam afore you were a twinkle in 'er eye.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:17 AM

Oh, both Eliza and John must count as young, surely.

Personally I get up feeling about 93 and go to bed feeling about 14, but the improvement during the day is subjective. Perhaps it would be best not to go to bed at all.

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,eliza c
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:11 AM

John Spiers of Bellowhead is considered a young performer, and I am considered one of the old guard, though we are exactly the same age...
xe
;-)
ps OK,I'm a month older.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 06:06 AM

I'm with the leveller - I'm a young 63. My boss, on the other hand, was born 50 :-)

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: theleveller
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 05:51 AM

Youth is not only relative, it's a state of mind. I'm a young 59. I know some old people in their 30s.

Subject: RE: What counts as young?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 05:41 AM

While us older folks are still alive,and singing, they will always be the younger performers. Eventually they too will become grumpy old men and women, then it's their turn to complain about 'These youngsters today'

G

Subject: What counts as young?
From: GUEST,Golightly
Date: 07 Jul 08 - 05:31 AM

Hi all,

apologies if you've discussed this ad nauseam, but I'm quite new to Mudcat.
The thread about Rachel Unthank and the Winterset has made me wonder where we draw the line at referring to performers as young?
It's my understanding that Rachel is in her 30s, though I cannot vouch for that, and I think that when we specifically refer to a performer's youth we are often commenting on their skill relative to their age.
So when do we instinctively stop making that connection and judge performances purely on merit? What do you all think?